Amazon launches first internet satellites in bid to compete with Starlink

Amazon stretched its reach to space, sending its first two internet satellites to orbit, a key step toward building out a constellation of more than 3,000 satellites that it hopes will compete with SpaceX’s Starlink system to provide online access to millions without it. The pair of prototype satellites were launched from Cape Canaveral (FL) on October 6. Over the coming days and weeks, Amazon hopes to use the satellites to “add real-world data from space to years of data collected from lab and field testing” as it works to put up the rest of its Kuiper constellation. Amazon, which has said it intends to invest more than $10 billion in the network, hopes to launch its first production satellites during the first half of next year and begin preliminary testing with commercial customers by the end of 2024. Under its license from the Federal Communications Commission, it must launch half of the 3,236 satellites it foresees in the constellation by July 2026.